Description

25 CCSS-aligned lessons walking students through writing passionate argumentative letters about an issue they care most about, one letter of which they will mail at the end of the unit.

The unit begins by exploring how teen activists have changed the world by speaking out about what they believe in, and then guides students through identifying what they’d like to change in the world. The remaining 5 weeks of lessons teach students Common Core argumentative skills, addressing the most common issues students struggle with argumentative writing: analyzing evidence, integrating quotes, evaluating reliable sources, including a counterargument, and many more.

The unit is meant not just to hone students’ argumentative skills, but also teach them how to exercise their voice. It was inspired by a unit I did with my own students right after the November 2016 elections—after which we received a signed letter response from President Barack Obama! I would love for your students to experience the same excitement and reward for using their voice to speak out.

This 5-week, 200+ page unit includes:

-50 pages of detailed lesson plans

-145-Slide Powerpoint

-35 pages of printables for scaffolding instruction and assessment

-Links to mentor texts

Each lesson plan includes:

-CCSS Standards

-Content Objectives

-Language Objectives–especially useful for your Emergent Multilinguals (ELLs), but benefit all students

-Mini-lesson–plan and slides

-Work-time–plan and slides

-Share-time–plan and slides

-Ideas, logs, and handouts for formative assessment

Each day’s slides includes:

-Do Now

-Objectives–both content and language

-Visuals for mini-lesson

Skills covered by lesson plans include:

-Claim, evidence, and reasoning

-Connecting evidence to claim (reasoning)

-Including a variety of evidence

-Structuring logical body paragraphs

-Introductions

-Conclusions

-Coming up with research questions

-Evaluating reliable sources

-When to quote vs. paraphrase

-How to cite

-Writing counterarguments

-And more!

This unit plan also includes the following individual products:

• Argumentative Outline Lesson
• Brainstorming a Choice Topic for Argumentative Writing
• Claims, Evidence, Reasoning Lesson Plan
• Counterargument Lesson Plan
• Editing Stations – Argumentative Writing
• Evaluating Reliable Sources
• Integrating Quotes Lesson
• Quote or Paraphrase? Lesson Plan

You can also purchase this unit plan through my Teachers Pay Teachers store here.